Sig Christenson: Beyond ‘Betray Us’

Earlier today, Congress condemned it. So, too, did President Bush. What struck me as rather curious, of course, is their sense of outrage.

It’s rather selective and certainly calibrated to produce certain results, which prompts me to wonder just how upset those officeholders truly are. And remember, these are the same folks who often decry the politicization of this war.

Many of the same people so upset with MoveOn.org have had far less to say about the outrageous and even hateful things people like Ann Coulter have said on occasion. Take the time she attacked four 9-11 widows some have nicknamed “the Jersey girls,” saying, “I’ve never seen people enjoying their husbands’ deaths so much.”

She also once said, “My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building.”

If Bush is justified in calling the MoveOn.or ad “disgusting,” what is that?

If you’ve spent time in Iraq or have been around the troops you know how disconnected the debate here over the war is from reality.

Everyone sees it through their own political prism.

Bush today told reporters he was led to one conclusion:” that most Democrats are afraid of irritating a left-wing group like MoveOn.org, or more afraid of irritating them, than they are of irritating the United States military.”

It’s a statement of some irony.

The president may or may not know this, but some of Petraeus’ staff members years ago reportedly called him “General Betrayus.” I learned that from a source who is in a position to know, a source I trust implicitly.

That is a sad commentary, if true – and I hope it’s not. I’ve spent some time with Petraeus and think highly of him.

But whatever the case, this business over the MoveOn.org ad is a sophomoric debate worthy of student government at the two state universities I attended. It is a betrayal of our troops and their mission at one of the most critical moments of the war. Real leaders on both sides of the aisle ought to do better than that.

Watch a doctor stand in a pool of blood as he saws off what is left of a soldier’s leg in a dusty tent hospital north of Baghdad, as I did only a year ago, and you’ll tire of the gamesmanship.

Four years on in Iraq, a war that could run years longer with many more American amputees and dead, and still these Mickey Mouse moments? It’s time to get beyond “Betray Us.”